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Dota 2 Guide to playing Phoenx, Support and Carry

By David Mulgrew, 03/02/2014 - 12:38

Phoenix is one of Dota 2's newest heroes and hes quickly become one of my favourites due to how good a nuker he can be if you can get around his tendency to chew through his own helath. Phoenix is the first hero I decided to write a guide for and I've really enjoyed doing it so I hope you find it useful. I've tried him out as a carry and a support. New players will likely find the carry build easier to play but if you have a good team to back you up you will find the support build does much more to help your team.

All of the videos in this series will feature some general tips with Phoenix. I suggest you play a game or two after watching each video though. I've tried to make each video independent but the tactics do get a little more intricate as the videos progress. Lets start with a quick overview of Phoenix's abilities and play style.

DOTA 2 Phoenix Showcase Guide

This is just a quick overview of the character for people who have never seen phoenix in action or don't really know what hes about. If you are already very familiar with him you can probably skip this video.

DOTA 2 Phoenix Carry Guide

As a good friend of mine has pointed out, Synergy, this could more accurately be called a "farm" guide than a carry. When I firs made it I found myself in the hard lane a lot with a support character behind me so wanted to make best use of the gold that the support didn't need. Most of the items in this build are from the side shop so you won't need to hog the courier. As you will see form the video Phoenix chews through his own health a lot so rushing all the regen items makes him much more effective. This build will be a little easier to get to grips with so if your new to phoenix I suggest you start here.

DOTA 2 Phoenix Support Guide

As you will have noticed in the first build Phoenix has a lot of Support items like the Mek. This is because he needs both passive and active regen to counteract his tendency to chew through his own health. This lends itself to playing him as a support character so I wrote this build to try that out and it works amazingly well. You will notice Unlike most builds there is no regen in the starting items, apart form the ring. Well with this build you will be playing from the back and will be getting some very high health regen for early game so it shouldn't be necessary. most players will also tell you to avoid putting all your eggs in one basket and giving the same support character mana boots, Mek and Pipe. This combination works amazingly well on Phoenix. This build is a little high risk though and does require propper teamwork to be really effective. You need to tell your team that if you initiate with your ultimate that they should not back off no matter what. IF you manage to get most of the enemy team with fire spirits BEFORE using your ult you will usually find that even if they kill you or another of your team the enemy team will take massive damage doing it so anyone who sticks around can pick off the rest of the enemy team easily. The great thing about playing Phoenix as a utility support hero is that as he gets better active regen and defence items he becomes a more reliable nuker.

DOTA 2 Phoenix Tanking Towers with Supernova

Ok so this may be a waste of an ult on occasion but its handy to know since sometimes it can be useful. It can also be useful to ult the enemy barracks since most enemies won't usually run into a supernova unless they are sure they can kill you quickly. That can often give you the space you need for your team to take the barracks and anyone who does run in while your doing it will take huge damage and your team will probably kill them.